


Chamomile Tea

by gaydaractivate04



Series: Batfam Feels (The Good And The Bad) [1]
Category: Batman - All Media Types
Genre: Alfred vs Tim's caffeine addiction, Alfred wins, Batfamily (DCU) Feels, Damian Wayne is Bad at Feelings, Dick Grayson is a Ray of Sunshine, Fluff, For The Moment, Lots of Tea, Sickness, Tea, Tim Drake Catches A Cold, Tim Drake Needs a Break, Tim Drake-centric, and also tissues, he gets one, i think this qualifies
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-25
Updated: 2021-01-25
Packaged: 2021-03-17 12:54:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,738
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28974687
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gaydaractivate04/pseuds/gaydaractivate04
Summary: Tim is fine.He is perfectly healthy. He can run faster than ever before, his heart is in great condition considering the daily caffeine intake, and he hasn’t missed a jump inmonths.A common cold will not take him down, not with a dry throat or congested sinuses or a headache that doesn’t know the meaning of tylenol.He is Red Robin and he is fine.OrTim lasts all of one night hiding a terrible cold.
Relationships: Tim Drake & Alfred Pennyworth, Tim Drake & Damian Wayne, Tim Drake & Dick Grayson
Series: Batfam Feels (The Good And The Bad) [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2125275
Comments: 4
Kudos: 173





	Chamomile Tea

**Author's Note:**

> Basically, this was inspired by some Tumblr post a friend showed me. I don't remember the name of the user nor can I link it (seeing as I didn't find it) but if anyone knows what I'm talking about, please let me know!
> 
> I hope everyone is doing well during the first month of 2021 and is not fighting off a cold (as I am now)
> 
> I hope ya'll enjoy the story!

Tim is fine.

He is perfectly healthy. He can run faster than ever before, his heart is in great condition considering the daily caffeine intake, and he hasn’t missed a jump in  _ months. _

A common cold will not take him down, not with a dry throat or congested sinuses or a headache that doesn’t know the meaning of tylenol. 

He is Red Robin and he is fine.

The first slip up happens on patrol, Nightwing by his side as they take a breather, perched on the edge of a roof. They were waiting for Oracle to hop on the comms, to update them on the others, when a scream came from the alley below, cut off before it could reach listening ears.

Most ears, that is.

The mugger had women up against a wall, his hand covering her mouth as he brandished a knife in her face, his voice a low growl as he ordered her to hand over her purse and empty her pockets.

Easy pickings.

Really, in a city filled with vigilantes, it was strange that every criminal forgot the most important thing:  _ look up. _

Tim leaped from the roof nearly silently, after Dick nodded at him to go. It didn’t take the two of them to bring down a mugger, and Red Robin could do the job just fine.

And he  _ could. _   
  


It was just that several things happened at once. The man turned around, some sixth sense activating moments too late, his grip leaving the woman as he went to attack Tim instead. The woman took off, sprinting into the night, as every smart citizen knew to do when their attacker was distracted.

A gunshot went off less than a block away and Tim shifted towards it on instinct, leaving himself  _ vulnerable, _ giving the mugger a rare opportunity -- the chance to get a punch in.

It wasn’t a very good punch, clipping Tim in the temple, but he was unprepared and already in pain and  _ sick  _ -

He dodged the next blow, letting the man’s momentum carry himself directly into Tim’s range, making it ridiculously easy for him to knock the mugger out with a sharp blow to the jaw. It was over in less than ten seconds, yet he struggled to stay upright as the pounding in his head doubled, Nightwing landing beside him moments later.

_ So long as he didn’t notice... _

“Are you alright?” That was Dick’s Big Brother Mode voice, and he was not ready to be smothered in concern, not tonight.

_ Crap. _

Dick’s hands were on his face, holding his chin carefully as he tilted Tim’s face side to side, peering into his eyes -- as if that would make a difference, as if he could see anything through the white lenses of the domino mask.

“I’m fine, it was just a lucky hit.” Tim batted Dick’s hands away, pasting a smile on as he stepped back. He’d practiced that smile all his childhood, during every gala where his parents paraded him around for three hours before leaving him for another month.

It was a very good smile, a very realistic one, and he knew it.

It didn’t seem to convince his brother enough, who glanced at him every twenty seconds -- perhaps expecting Tim to keel over at any given moment.

The longest he looked away was for twenty three seconds while dropping the would-be-mugger outside the precinct,  _ he’d counted. _

“Seriously, what do you want me to do, recite the ABCs backwards?” he asked, turning the light, joking tone up a notch in an attempt to placate Dick.

It worked, the tension leaking from his brother’s frame as he laughed, shaking his head. “Come on, I’m calling it a night. Alfred will have our heads if we don’t get in bed soon.”

That night, Tim’s bed felt softer than it had ever been before.

  
  


_______________

  
  


Tim was  _ not fine. _

He felt like he’d been hit by a truck, every bruise from the night before radiating  _ pain _ as he sat upright, fumbling for the bedside alarm. His chest was tight, breathes wheezing out, his nose too congested for any air to escape.

To top that, his headache had returned, and it came for revenge.

He didn’t bother turning on the lights as he staggered into the attached bathroom, they’d only make everything worse _. _

Squinting in the dim room, Tim fumbled for the faucet, turning the water as cold as he could, as high as he could, in an attempt to drive out the pure  _ exhaustion _ that hovered around him, and splashed it over his face, spilling down the front of his shirt.

He shivered. Sneezed.

The warm water worked much better, soothing both his nose and puffy eyes. He spent another five minutes in the bathroom, alternating between holding his face under the faucet and dabbing it dry with his towel.

By the end, he looked more like a living being, rather than an unfortunately young victim of the plague.

Surviving breakfast, on the other hand, was much more difficult.

Damian’s face was the first to greet him when he arrived at the table, Bruce’s hidden behind an unfolded newspaper and early morning stupor.

“Drake. You look terrible. Do you still not know what vitamins are?”  _ Pleasant as always, brat. _

Tim glared at him, slumping into the chair across the table as he reached for the mug in front of him, already steaming and filled with coffee. “I’m fine, thanks for asking.” His voice, hoarse as it was, did not support his argument.

“Jesus, Replacement, what the hell happened to you?” Jason stalked in, smirking -  _ despite being the one wearing Wonder Woman pants _ \- an expression which quickly transformed to  _ worry. _ “You get run over, or something?”

Tim muttered what might have been  _ “I’ll run you over,” _ but he wasn’t sure the remark made it past his lips.

Dick, who’d been following Jason, heard the question and immediately made a beeline to Tim’s chair, leaning into his space and checking his forehead and being  _ so concerned - _

“You’re running a little warm, are you sick? Did you get hit with something?” His brother’s face was inches from Tim’s, eyes roving from purple bruise decorating his temple to his eyes, likely checking for blown pupils or a concussion,  _ something _ to explain his appearance.

Tim didn’t think he looked that bad, considering how he felt. “Christ, I’m fine, you all can stop worrying, because nothing’s wrong.”

Alfred chose the moment to enter, likely having heard the entire conversation - if it could be called that - through the open doorway that led to the kitchen. Because Tim had no allies, Alfred crossed directly to Tim’s spot and switched his mug of coffee for what could only be  _ chamomile tea. _

_ Chamomile.  _ Might as well get it over with and kill him where he sat, if he was going to be stuck drinking that.

“Master Tim is sick, and will be staying home for the day.”

“But I -”

Alfred raised an eyebrow.

Tim stayed home for the day.

  
  


_______________

  
  


It wasn’t that bad, over all. He watched two movies, slept through another two, and suffered to the bottom of four mugs of tea. He stayed in his room, curtains drawn and lights off, even getting the rare privilege of lunch in bed.

Alfred left to pick Damian up from school as it neared late afternoon, giving Tim strict instructions of what to do if he began to feel lightheaded or dizzy.

Tim attempted to savor his last half hour of peace, which passed far too quickly to truly have been the right amount of time. He heard his youngest brother stomping up the stairs and fully expected him to stomp on past his door.

Instead, to his great dismay, Tim’s door was flung open, far too harshly and far too loudly. 

“Drake,” said Damian, dropping a huge stack of papers onto Tim’s bed, worksheets and lined paper spilling onto his blankets. “I procured your school work for the day, as Pennyworth requested.”

Tim squinted at him, at the light spilling from the hallway, where he sat hunched over his computer. He’d blocked out all the light in an attempt to alleviate the pain of his headache, and it had been going  _ so well. _

“You know,” Tim began, voice nasally and thick. “When someone is sick, they usually want chocolate or something, not a million math problems.”

“If you knew how to properly care for yourself, you would not be as useless as you are now.” Damian crossed his arms, looking down at Tim in a manner that could only be described as  _ imperious. _ He stood that way for a few moments longer before relenting. “I completed all the work, simple as it was. All you must do is sign your name.”

_ Maybe Dick was getting to the Demon Brat. _

“Chocolate means nothing to me.”

Damian sniffed, standing a good three feet away, as if to avoid chronic idiocy, as Tim’s ‘condition’ had been named, courtesy of Jason.

“You got much homework?” When Damian shook his head, Tim continued, closing his computer and setting it aside. “Want to watch Up with me? I was just about to start it. You can sit up here, if you want.”

He gestured to the bed, the empty space beside him, only to feel his hand drag through something  _ wet. _ Glancing down, he remembered the three boxes of tissues he’d finished off and where the used tissues had gone.

After a pause, his sick mind working hard to find a solution, he gathered the damp tissues into a pile, balled them up best he could, and threw them into the bedside wastebasket. His aim was remarkably well, seeing as  _ almost half _ made it in.

The look of horror and disgust on Damian’s face was worth the residual dampness clinging to his palms as he gestured, again, to his bed.

Instead of sitting beside him, or anywhere near the last resting places of the tissues, Damian perched himself on the end of Tim’s bed, hands tucked under his arms. For a child raised surrounded by killing, the demon brat was very germaphobic. 

“Well, Drake? Do you intend to start the movie or sit here until your overworked lungs give out?”  _ For a child raised surrounded by killing, he was very pushy. _

They were twenty minutes into it, when Damian spoke again. “This is acceptable.”

Tim pretended not to see his younger brother cry as the credits rolled.

  
  


**Author's Note:**

> Hey y'all! I hope this was a good story and it made you smile, that was the purpose of it.
> 
> This was my first Batfam fic, I hope I did our beloved characters justice.
> 
> Please lemme know what you thought!!


End file.
